NIPRD,SON partner to improve living standard of Nigerians

January 10th, 2019

By Hassan Zaggi

The National Institute for Pharmaceutical Research and Development (NIPRD) and the Standards Organisation of Nigeria (SON) have enter into partnership to strengthen their services in order to positively improve the living standards of Nigerians.

This is even as SON has urged NIPRD to partner with it to establish standards for new products and services, particularly in the field of nanotechnology and traditional and herbal medicinal commodities currently being used in the country.

This is the outcome of the meeting between top managements of the two agencies when the Director General of NIPRD, Dr Obi Peter Adigwe, paid a visit to the Director General of SON, Mr. Osita Aboloma, in his office in Abuja, recently.

Speaking, the DG of NIPRD, Dr. Peter Adigwe, disclosed that his agency’s laboratories have gain international accreditation status with ISO 9001:2008 and ISO 17025:2015 Quality Management Systems and Testing.

This, according to him, indicated the commitment of NIPRD to providing high integrity services to all clients of the institute.

With these two accreditations, any product tested in NIPRD can be accepted in any part of the world.

On his part, the DG of SON, Mr. Osita Aboloma, applauded the NIPRD Chief Executive for the visit and vowed that SON will always be available to partner with his Institute.

He further commended what he described as the renewed zeal of NIPRD under the leadership of Dr. Adigwe to sustain QMS and take it to higher heights.

He reiterated that improved synergy between the two institutions would bring about efficiency, hence, ensure that Nigerians get value for their payments for both products and services procured, as “ it will improve customer satisfaction and guarantee safety and reliability in use of goods and services.”

At the end of the meeting, assurances were jointly reached to enhance surveillance audit of services and products by SON; the provision of technical support and fee waiver for the training of more Certified Quality Management Systems (QMS) auditors and the inclusion of NIPRD certified auditors in the numerous auditing programmes across the country.